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Glass. 
Book 



STAMMERING AND ITS 
EXTIRPATION 



BY 

ERNEST TOMPKINS 

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Los Angeles, California 



Reprinted from the Pedagogical Seminary 
June, 1916, Vol. XXIII, pp. 153-174 



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STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION ^-O 

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By Ernest Tompkins, Los Angeles, California 



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The Difference Between Stuttering and Stammering. — In the 
English language, as the words are generally used, stuttering 
is habitual repetition and stammering is spasmodic abortive 
speech. However, stammerers sometimes resort to stutter- 
ing before a feared word. The distinguishing difference be- 
tween stuttering and stammering is that stuttering is under 
the control of the will and stammering is not, except to 
decline to indulge in it. Stuttering is found almost exclu- 
sively in children soon after they have learned to talk, al- 
though some adults stutter slightly through carelessness in 
speech. Uncorrected stuttering soon develops into stammer- 
ing. In the transition stage the stuttering is still noticeable, 
but it soon disappears, and the disorder becomes wholly un- 
controllable, except to desist from it. 

Some American speech specialists have confused the mean- 
ing of the words ''stuttering" and ''stammering" by using 
. .them somewhat in the sense of the German words Stam- 
melen, baby talk, and Stottern, stammering. 

The Stammerer Can Say What He Thinks He Cannot 
Say, — Some years ago I was on a horse car in Troy, N. Y., 
going tD"^ard Albia, and the car stopped at the switch near 
the junction of Congress* and Ferry Streets. While we 
waited for the other car to pass lis, the conductor called 
to a four-year-old boy on the stoop ' of Nagengast's store, 
** Who. gave you a penny yesterday?" The boy replied, 
** Ma, ma, ma, ma, ma, ma. Ma." The marked emphasis 
on the last syllable was accompanied by a shake of the head 
as if to shake the syllable out. 

Before I comment on this incident, I want to call to the 
reader's attention the importance of the incident itself, and 
the importance of drawing only correct conclusions from it. 
The incident involves stammering on a word in which both 
syllables are alike, by a stammerer in his natural environ- 
ment, in the presence of numerous witnesses, and of an 
observer familiar with stammering. It is evident that such 
a combination of circumstances can occur only rarely. If 

Qiit 

7 AU(3 16 



154 STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 

the combination was of frequent occurrence the cause of 
stammering would probably have been discovered long ago. 

Was the child really a stammerer? Yes. The audible 
and visible emphasis on the last syllable is the spasm that 
characterizes stammering. If the child had failed to utter 
the last syllable or had failed to say all of it, the evidence 
that he was a stammerer would have been indisputable; but 
complete failure to say a syllable is not necessary for stam- 
mering, so to dispute that this was stammering would be 
only to stand on an untenable technicality. 

Granting then t^Jaat this child was a stammerer, we see 
without any assumptions: — 

1. He said what he wanted to say when he had uttered 
two syllables. 

2. He thought that he could not say what he wanted to 
say, or he would have discontinued after he had said two 
syllables. 

Therefore, since 1. cannot be disputed, the thought that 
he could not say what he wanted to say was erroneous. In 
other words, he could say what he wanted to say at the time 
he thought he could not say it. It is well known that the 
stammerer can say on some occasions what he fails to say on 
other occasions ; but I believe it has never before been proved 
definitely that a stammerer can at the same time say what 
he thinks he cannot say. 

Further analysis of the case results in the same conclu- 
sion; but we have to make an assumption, namely, that the 
child thought that he could not say the second . syllable of 
the word, so he repeated the first syllable until he had the 
courage to try the second, and then "jumped" at that in 
order to force it out. I think that no one who is familiar 
with stammering will question this assumption. 

This shows that the child was actually saying "ma" all 
the time he thought he could not say it. Moreover, it is 
evident to any careful observer of stammering that if the 
child had used slightly more force on the last syllable, he 
would have failed to completely utter that; so the child 
would have been in the anomalous condition of actually 
saying what he actually failed to say. The inevitable con- 
clusion, viewed from any angle, is, that the ability to say 
what he desired to say was constantly present, and that the 
idea of inability was totally erroneous. 

The instance given is valuable as showing the origin of 
stammering. The child had acquired the habit of stutter- 
ing; ridicule was prompting him to make a conscious effort 
to speak correctly; and this conscious effort, conflicting with 



STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 155 

his normal speech, was making a stammerer of him. The 
beginning of his reply was stuttering, since it was repetition 
without effort; the ridicule was evident; and the stammering 
effort on the last syllable was both audible and visible. In 
my opinion, accurate observation will show that a large 
proportion of the stammerers start as stutterers. Stuttering 
is known to be a common habit among children ; and the habit 
may become so fixed that the child will make a conscious 
effort to correct it instead of merely talking slowly. The 
failure to recognize stuttering as a cause of stammering is 
perfectly natural. The public has no definite idea of the 
difference, so it would consider that stammering began when 
the child started to stutter, and would look for another 
cause. The speech specialist, who is practically the only 
statistician of stammering, and not always a perfectly im- 
partial one, asks the parent how the child became a stam- 
merer. The parent has no definite explanation; so the 
specialist suggests the causes that he knows of — a blow on 
the head, a fright, an illness. Certainly the child has had 
something included in the list, so the parent concludes that 
the event of this description, which happened not long be- 
fore the stammering was noticed, must have been the cause 
of the stammering, and the conclusion goes to build up the 
statistics of the subject. 

Summary. — The stammerer is always able to talk. Stut- 
tering is a cause, and probably an important cause, of stam- 
mering. Ridicule of stutterers makes stammerers of them. 

Stammering Is a Conscious Effort at Speech. — Normal speech 
is automatic. No one knows how he speaks. Let anyone 
who questions that sit down and write out just what muscles 
are used and the exact sequence of their use in saying the 
word California. He will soon convince himself that he does 
not know how he talks. But since he does talk, and since 
he does not know how he talks, then he does not talk con- 
sciously, but must talk automatically. 

Now it has been shown that the stammerer can say what 
he fears he cannot say. Also, it is recognized that he makes 
an effort to talk. But since he does not know how he talks 
the effort conflicts with his normal automatic speech, and he 
stammers. In other words, stammering is a conflict between 
normal speech and a conscious effort misdirected through 
ignorance of its proper direction. 

The proof of the cause of stammering may be deduced 
from the known facts by pure reason, as follows: — 

1. The stammerer's normal speech is automatic, so 

2. He does not know how he speaks. 



156 STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 

3. When he wills to speak, automatic speech begins, but 

4. He makes a conscious effort at the same time, therefore, 

5. The conscious effort must conflict with the automatic 
speech. 

Although this proof shows that stammering must result 
from a conscious effort at speech, there may be some who 
will say that another cause is possible. Let us assume some 
other cause and see what the assumption leads us to. This 
cause must appear and disappear synchronously with stam- 
mering. But the changes from normal to abnormal speech 
are so rapid and hitherto unexplainable that not even one 
cause could be found that met the conditions, whereas we 
are now in the position of supplying two. Moreover, even 
the assumption of any particular cause was the result of a 
need of an explanation, whereas we now have a perfectly 
valid explanation. Therefore the assumed cause is an ab- 
surdity. Consequently there can be no other explanation 
of stammering than collision between normal and conscious 
speech. 

Although the conclusion that stammering is a conscious 
effort at speech was reached through consideration of the 
"mama" incident, the reader should not think that it is 
based wholly or even considerably on that. I have tested 
the conclusion with every means at my command, and have 
never found it wanting; on the contrary, I have never found 
any other explanation that was not wanting. The deficiency 
of all other explanations of which I have ever heard, and the 
sufficiency of this one, appear to make it dependable. How- 
ever, I will add some contributory evidence from recognized 
authorities. 

Dr. Scripture says: — " The habit stage is often initiated 
by shock or exhaustion. The person finds himself making 
inaccurate movements and speaking a word or words indis- 
tinctly. On account of the excessive nervous irritability in 
these conditions, he feels that he cannot permit himself to 
speak in an improper fashion, so he instinctively tries to cor- 
rect the inaccurate movements by an extra effort at distinctness. 
Such an effort produces excessive muscular tension .... 
This in turn impresses itself on the memory, so that when he 
again makes the same sounds, he naturally makes excessive 
muscular movements." 

Excepting the conclusion, these words are almost the 
exact ones in which I explained the origin of stammering 
long before I ever heard of Dr. Scripture or of this quota- 
tion. My explanation is as follows: The child, through an 
accident or incident, suffers a temporary speech disturbance 
and makes a conscious effort to overcome that disturbance — 



STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 157 

now notice the difference in the two explanations — but the 
conscious effort is opposed to normal speech instead of added 
to it. The incompleteness of Dr. Scripture's explanation is 
shown by the absence of a cause for speech stoppage; he 
merely accounts for excessive movement, whereas the oppo- 
sition of movement, resulting in stoppage, is accounted for 
by my explanation. 

Dr. Scripture says further: " Many a one will say that 
if he could only forget that he had stuttered he would never 
stutter again." (It should be noted that Dr. Scripture uses 
the word "stutter" with the meaning of the English word 
''stammer.") The explanation is that forgetfulness of the 
habit would eliminate the conscious effort, and normal speech 
would assert itself. He says again: " If the question is 
asked of a patient in the fright stage ' Why do you stutter,' 
he will answer, ' Because I am afraid that I will stutter.' " 
The fright induces the conscious effort at speech, which 
blocks the automatic speech and causes stammering. 

Dr. Albert Liebmann, speaking to the stammerer, says: 
''Mit der mechanischen Sprache habe ich positiv nichts zu 
thuHy ich muss nur den Sprachapparat gewdhren las sen, dam it 
er nach seinen immanenten Gesetzen arbeiten kann.'' A trans- 
lation of which is : I have nothing to do with my automatic 
speech ; I must leave my speech organs free to operate accord- 
ing to their own inherent laws. 

This is evidence that stammering is a conscious effort at 
speech, for we know that the stammerer makes the conscious 
effort and stammers, whereas Dr. Liebmann says he will talk 
freely if he does not interfere with his automatic speech. 
Dr. Liebmann is the one man of whom I know who is work- 
ing consistently on the right principle. 

Dr. Chervin's justly celebrated triad of stammering is: — 

1. Begins in childhood. 

2. Absent in singing and solitude. 

3. Intermittent. 

The singing question will be discussed later. Taking up 
the other questions, we find as follows: — 1. Since stammer- 
ing is a conscious effort at speech, it canot occur before the 
child has learned to talk, as items 2 and 3 show. After the 
child has learned to talk, faulty speech occurs from the 
habit of repeating words — simple stuttering — from imitating 
stutterers or stammerers, from fright or from illness. The 
latter cases are explained as follows : When the child is 
recovering from the fright or illness, control of the will re- 
turns before control of the speech organs, and the child, 
noticing its deficiency, makes a conscious effort to speak; 



158 STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 

but this effort, being misdirected, is a stammer, so the child 
believes it cannot talk properly. Once this false belief is 
instilled in the child, it will stammer; for it will make the 
conscious effort to overcome the difficulty. 

Consider the absence of stammering in solitude, the last 
part of the second item of the triad. This is explainable on 
the grounds that since the stammerer is his own exclusive 
auditor, and since he knows his thoughts, there is no need 
of speaking them; so no effort is made if they are vSpoken. 
Speech specialists recognize that it is easy for the stam- 
merer to say what his auditor already knows. Dr. Bryant 
points out the frequent occurrence in which the stammerer 
cannot say his name until after he has given his auditor 
his card. 

Item 3 of the triad states the fact that, under apparently 
the same circumstances, the stammerer will stammer and 
then say the word without stammering. The explanation 
is that the stammerer will stammer when his speech is upper- 
most in his mind, because he will make a^ conscious effort to 
talk, but he will not stammer when he is distracted from his 
speech, for then normal speech will assert itself. 

Denhart, after showing how fear paralyses action says: 
" Supported by the analogies mentioned, we can safely state, 
that no objection may be feared to the theory already pro- 
mulgated, — that stammering is a psychosis having its origin 
in some more or less casual incident in the history of the 
patient. This psychosis is based upon a- delusion, an abso- 
lutely unfounded belief that there exists an impediment to 
the free use of speech. This delusion wreaks havoc with 
the different innervations requisite for oral speech. Neither 
the expression 'fear' (Schranck) nor the term 'doubt' (Wyneken) 
is applicable to this delusion, for when the delusion arises 
there is no doubt, but subjective certainty; that this cer- 
tainty is not always accompanied by such feelings of malaise 
(Unlustgefilhle) as would justify one in speaking of 'lalo- 
phobia' or 'speech fear'. These feelings of malaise are 
secondary, being induced by the delusion,-— which naturally 
enough gives rise to painful experiences. One might regard 
stammering as one of the manifold forms of hypochondria 
if the symptoms of the latter affection were delusions con- 
cerning bodily disabilities, rather than 'fear and anxiety for 
the body itself.' Should the revived memory picture possess 
sufficient clearness and intensity to awaken feelings of anxiety 
and fear, and should its fatal influence not be neutralized 
by reason or by an unwavering faith in one's own faculties, 
then there steps in for a second time bewilderment and delay 
to wreak havoc with the movements that should give oral 



STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 159 

expression to thought. The incident will be repeated, and 
with every repetition the disturbances find an easier victory. 
The anxiety rising from the recollection has shown itself 
to be well founded. Any dubiety as to its foundation, which 
might at first have appeared, is silenced by the seemingly 
incontrovertible evidence of fact. Forthwith there disappears 
anxiety — care lest there should recur those unhappy disturb- 
ances with which the malady began — and in its stead there 
prevails the subjective certainty that the stammerer no 
longer has unimpeded use of speech. Thus there is estab- 
lished the delusional belief that any attempt to speak is 
frustrated by an actual impediment ; though this impediment 
has in truth no existence outside the imagination of the now 
fully developed stammerer. This belief, with the concomit- 
ant feelings of malaise (at times weaker and at times stronger) 
is thenceforth the invariable cause of stammering." (Quoted 
from Bluemel.) I had never heard of this explanation until 
I saw it in Bluemel's book on March 2, 1915. After one 
wonders at Denhart's foresight, the next wonder is that such 
a wealth of truth as is in these remarks should have been 
left dormant instead of used to emancipate the stammerers. 
However, the description is faulty in considering the original 
disability a delusion instead of a fact, in considering the 
impediment a delusion, and in lack of an explanation of the 
manner in which havoc is wrought with the movements that 
should give oral expression to thought. That the original 
disability which caused the conviction of disability is not a 
delusion is readily seen from consideration of the circum- 
stances. Take the case in which a child has acquired the 
habit of repeating words, that is to say, stuttering. This 
is a simple habit, as is proved by the fact that- admonition 
to talk slowly will stop it. This simple habit stage may run 
for weeks. Since the parents do not notice it, naturally 
the child does not, until ridicule brings it to notice so forcibly 
that a conscious effort is made to overcome it. The child 
suddenly finds that its speech is sufficiently peculiar to cause 
strangers to laugh at it. How then can it be said that the 
child is suffering uiider a delusion of inability to talk? Such 
a claim is utterly groundless. It could only be made on the 
circumlocution that the child should have realized that it 
was stuttering, and that this could be corrected by delibera- 
tion. And to expect such maturity in the child is to exhibit 
infantility. 

The same conclusion holds for the cases in which stammer- 
ing is induced by shock, fright or illness. The broken speech 
of persons recovering from severe nervous stress is too much 
of a fact to be called a delusion. 



160 STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 

Bluemel quotes the following incident: *' H. Schmidt re- 
calls a case in which a hussar was kicked by a horse on the 
left side of the forehead, and suffered as a consequence from 
aphasia, deafness in the left ear, and paralysis of the right 
arm. Gradually the aphasia disappeared and stammering 
took its place. After four weeks his full vocabulary re- 
turned, but the stammering persisted." Bluemel adds: 
*' Many such cases are on record in which stammering has 
begun as aphasia." The explanation is that the recovering 
invalid, noticing an actual disability in his speech, makes a 
conscious effort at speech and adds stammering to the original 
disability, which latter gradually disappears but leaves the 
stammering in its place. 

Denhart says of the stammering subsequent to the begin- 
ning: " Thus there is established the delusional belief that 
any attempt to speak is frustrated by an actual impediment. 
." This is not a delusion; speech is impeded by a 
force which is just as much a fact as the force with which 
one locomotive collides with another; the muscular effort of 
automatic speech collides with the misdirected muscular 
effort of conscious speech. Although Denhart failed to 
observe the opposition of the musuclar effort, he did recog- 
nize some opposition, for he says: "An examination of the 
mental processes during stammering shows that the disturb- 
ance takes the form of a struggle between two opposing 
forces, — the will, which endeavors to translate the thought 
into spoken words, and the belief in one's inability to ac- 
complish what is intended." In other words, Denhart trans- 
poses the struggle from the muscles of speech to the mental 
speech processes. Suppose that the mental struggle resulted 
in a deadlock. Then no muscular effort would have occurred. 
But stammering is always characterized by a muscular effort. 
So Denhart shows by this last quoted statement that he not 
only failed to recognize the true explanation, of stammering, 
but he failed to recognize its most characteristic manifesta- 
tion, namely, abortive muscular effort. This alleged con- 
test in the mind helps to the interpretation of the state- 
ments, ". . . wrecks havoc with the different innerva- 
tions requisite for oral speech," and *'. . . wreak havoc 
with the movements that should give oral expression to 
thought." The meaning is the old lack of co-ordination, but 
no such lack will explain stammering. Its phenomena show, 
especially by their rapid changes, that normal speech must 
be ready always, and that the impediment must be a sur- 
plusage, not a lack. The surplusage is the misdirected 
conscious effort. 



STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 161 

Why the Stammerer Has No Difficulty in Singing. — The 
fact that the stammerer can sing what he thinks he cannot 
say, indicates the presence of one or more features in sing- 
ing which obviate stammering. Bearing in mind that stam- 
mering is a conscious effort at speech, let us see if we can 
discover what there is in singing and not in talking which 
avoids this conscious effort. 

1. Intonation would not seem to have any advantage. 
The stammerer talks best in the low registers, but singing 
includes the whole register, so altogether it seems to offer 
no advantage in that regard. 

2. Measure appears to have some advantage in over- 
coming stammering, as the almost universal practice of 
time-beating to cure stammering seems to show; the greater 
part of the advantage is undoubtedly distraction, but it 
would be unwise to deny any efhcacy to the time-beat until 
proof is available, 

3. Gradual start. This certainly tends to allay stammer- 
ing, for it discourages the convulsive actions which are char- 
acteristic of stammering. 

4. Continuity of sound. This also decreases the danger 
of stammering, for the start is always the most difficult for 
the stammerer, and continuity reduces the nimiber of starts 
to a minimum. 

5. The accented vowel. This is also a discourager of 
stammering. The vowel is the base of speech, just as the 
foundation is the base of the house. It is simpler to pro- 
duce the vowel than the articulated word, just as it is simpler 
to lay the foundation than to build the whole house. The 
nearer the stammerer stays to the vowels the less likely he 
is to stammer. 

Evidently, the gradual start, the accented vowel, and the 
continuity of sound are the important features of singing 
which obviate stammering. Probably the measure also 
contributes. 

Why Fatigue Makes Stammering Worse. — Since stammering 
is a conflict between automatic and conscious speech, and 
since the conscious speech is more thoroughly under the 
control of the will, automatic speech gives way before the 
determined efforts to talk. Moreover, the thoughts of the 
tired individual revert to his troubles, and especially to his 
physical ailments. Consequently the stammerer will think 
of his impediment more when he is tired than when he is 
not, and this self -consciousness will increase his speech 
difficulty. 



162 STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 

Why Consonants At the End of a Word Never Occasion 
Difficulty. — I have copied that question, but would like to 
restate it: Why do final consonants apparently never cause 
difficulty? The observation of stammering phenomena has 
not reached such a stage of perfection that we are in a safe 
position to say that stammering never occurs on a particular 
combination. We are in a much safer position when we 
select some combination on which stammering has been 
observed to occur and reason from that, than when we 
reason from something which we have not known to happen, 
but which might have happened. However, everyone con- 
versant with the subject will admit that stammering on a 
final consonant is very rare. The explanation is that by 
the time the stammerer is near the final consonant he is 
talking normally, and having said most of the word, he 
cannot reasonably fear to say the last of it. So he simply 
leaves his normal speech undisturbed, and it finishes as well 
as it would have begun if he had not interfered in the 
beginning. 

Why the Stammerer Can Usually Repeat Fluently the Words 
that Are Pronounced for Him by Another Person by Way of 
Assistance. — Suppose the words had not been pronounced 
for him. Then he would be burdened by a sense of the 
responsibility concerning the information to be imparted, and 
fear of inability to impart it would prompt him to make a 
conscious effort to speak, and he would stammer. The 
absence of that responsibility would, of course, make him 
less interested in what he had to say, so that he would say 
it more readily. The condition is similar to that in which 
a stammerer, failing to say his name, starts to write it and 
then says it before he has quite finished writing it. Before 
I knew what mussels looked like, I one day passed a fish 
market in the company of a stammering companion, and 
asked him what they were. He hesitated, then flexed his 
arm, pointed to his biceps muscle, and said "^mussels." The 
idea was that after I knew what he wanted to say he could 
say it. This is only one of the tantalizing features of stam- 
mering, failure to say a thing until there is no need of saying 
it, and then ability. 

Why the Stammerer Speaks Fluently in Concert with Other 
People. — Stammering is induced by fear of inability to talk. 
This fear prompts the conscious effort which blocks normal 
speech. Therefore if the stammerer does not fear that he 
cannot talk he will not make the conscious effort at speech, 
his normal speech will assert itself, and he will talk. No 



I 



STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 163 

fear assails him when he talks in concert, because he knows 
that his voice will not be missed evQn if he does stammer. 

The Stammering Cure. — The divergent opinions regarding 
the efficacy of stammering cures are one of the sure indica- 
tions of the inefficacy of practically the whole lot of them. 
But another indication is the pessimistic utterances of those 
who know and who are honest enough to tell the truth. 
Whether we accept Bluemel's report of an investigation 
showing possibly 2% of cures by the schools, or Dr. Makuen's 
opinion of possible 10%, the figures are sufficiently low to 
justify the general impression that it is incurable. Someone 
may say that 10% of cures would make such a conclusion 
impossible; and so it would, if one-tenth of the stammerers 
could count that they would be the ones to be cured. But 
the cures cannot be foretold. Any one stammerer might be 
among the lucky tenth, but we can have no assurance of 
it. This is an illuminating fact, for it shows that the cures 
are accidental. Nearly every cured stammerer is sure that 
he knows what cured him until he tries that knowledge on 
others and finds that it does not work, except in so few cases 
that they are negligible. 

But there is one grand, infallible cure. And whose would 
it be but Mother Nature's? Would she close the cut or 
join the broken bone and refuse to correct the halting speech? 
She is not so partial. She stands and has stood since man 
learned to talk, proffering, urging her remedy; and curing all 
who took it. But man in his blindness has apparently never 
seen this great work. He has been too busy at his task of 
devising futile remedies of his own. What cures he has made 
have resulted because they happened to contain some portion 
of Mother Nature's principle. Who does not recall a stam- 
mering youth who is now a fluent man? I know an elderly 
pharmacist who is as fluent as any man, yet some years ago 
he was prompted by my defective speech to tell me of his 
difficulties with stammering. He said that he had out- 
grown it entirely, except that when he was very tired he 
noticed a tendency to recurrence. 

I know another man in his prime who told me to my great 
surprise that he stammered. I could hardly believe him, for 
I had been with him much and had not noticed any pecu- 
liarity of speech. He explained, however, that he had stam- 
mered as a boy, but had so far outgrown it that he feared 
only two words. One word was not in common use, and 
the other was the name of a railroad station on a route 
which he occasionally traveled. When he was going to stop 
there, he always told the conductor to take out mileage to 



164 STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 

the next station beyond, to avoid the necessity of speaking 
the name of his destination. The improvement in my own 
speech during one part of my Hfe was so gratifying that I 
counted on a cure within a few years, until a relapse set in 
that put me back to hopelessness. 

I recall now having been told often by people who heard 
me stammer that they had stammered once but that the 
trouble had disappeared. At that time I did not think that 
their recovery really constituted a cure, although a long one; 
so I did not pay sufficient attention to record or remember 
the names of the persons, much less to inquire for the expla- 
nation of their recovery. However, we now have the expla- 
nation of all such cures, although the personal experiences 
would have been valuable for confirmation. 

Let us forget for the time being that we know what stam- 
mering is. Some readers may not accept the statement 
that stammering is a conscious effort at speech clashing with 
the normal speech, and it would not be fair to exclude those 
persons from the discussion of the cure because of their 
difference of opinion. We will start on the common ground 
of the past that fright causes stammering. For our further 
information call in Chervin's triad again. 

1. Begins in childhood. 

2. Absent in singing and solitude. 

3. Intermittent. 

From the third item of the triad we see that the stammerer 
does some correct talking as well as some stammering. Sup- 
pose he stammered only once a year. Before the year was 
over he would forget to be frightened, and then normal 
speech would assert itself, and he would be cured. This is 
an extreme case; but it shows the principle, namely the 
prevalence of correct speech over incorrect speech. When 
the correct speech builds up more confidence than the in- 
correct speech knocks down the stammering will decrease, 
and if the process is continued long enough, free speech will 
entirely assert itself. 

I do not know how this principle was brought to the de- 
liverance of the pharmacist; but I do know that my friend 
who stammered on only two words had been a traveling man 
for years ; and in my own case the period of marked improve- 
ment began when I started writing anything I feared to say, 
and the progress was greatest when I also traveled as a 
salesman of knitting machinery and did much talking. To 
the natural question which a non-stammerer will ask, ** How 
could you talk? " I will answer that my chief difficulty was 
with the introduction, but I got around that by using a card. 



STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 165 

or by writing what I wanted to say. Greetings and the 
weather were the next topics, and they did not trouble me 
much. The weather is so easy for the stammerers that it 
is a wonder that they have not long ago worn it out. Real 
business was more difficult, but by that time I was beginning 
to feel at home, so I generally explained that I stammered, 
and would need more time than usual. The time was always 
granted, so I managed to get along by dint of frequent word 
substitution. Quotations were a bugbear to me, but they 
should always be made in writing, and of course I was glad 
that they should, for that relieved me of the feeling that I 
ought to try to say them. By such management I got along 
with increasing smoothness. Moreover, I made it a prac- 
tice to talk to my side partner on the train, if he was dis- 
posed to talk. I avoided difficult words in such conversations 
and managed to get much free talking with but very little 
stammering. That answers the question of my ability to 
talk. Regarding the improvement of my friend, it seems that 
his exercise in comparatively free speech during his traveling 
must have been the main feature in his cure. As to my 
improvement, it is certain that the considerable amount of 
unembarrassed talking that I did and the writing of difficult 
words, both contributed to my improvement; for when I 
ceased traveling and went into an office where I had 
little talking to do, and practically all of that under em- 
barrassing conditions, my speech rapidly deteriorated. 

So both theory and practice show that the prevalence of 
correct talking over incorrect talking will cure stammering. 
Moreover, a little consideration will show that no other cure 
is possible. Memory is the connecting link in stammering; 
its retention of the last trouble prompts the effort which 
causes the next trouble, and so the chain of trouble is forged. 
Memory can be subdued for a time. It can be made subser- 
vient to the suggestion of the mesmerist, and perfect speech 
will result, but when the subject comes back to his own 
suggestions, memory revives the past failures to cause new 
ones. The only way to defeat the vigilant memory is to so 
crowd it with successes in talking that the failures have no 
room. Then the stammerer is cured. Confidence will do 
much to overcome stammering, but it will not entirely over- 
come the memory of failures. 

The slowness of nature's cure is its only drawback. Every- 
thing else is highly satisfactory; no cost; no difficulty; no 
removal to strange surroundings with the danger of relapse 
on return; no interruption of occupation. But even the 
length of time required may be reduced by merely assisting 
natture in obvious ways; such as resolutely substituting writ- 



166 STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 

ing for stammering, and by seeking and improving oppor- 
tunities for free speech, such as walks with a congenial friend. 

Women Acquire Stammering as Much as Men Do. — The 
manifestations of stammering in women are the same as in 
men. Through all the long list of peculiarities no difference 
is found; begins in childhood subsequent to the age of speech 
acquisition; absent in singing and solitude; intermittent; in- 
creases with fear; increases with fatigue; decreases with hap- 
piness; ceases under mesmeric suggestion, etc., etc. The 
causes, namely, stuttering, imitation, fright, shock and ill- 
ness, are the same. Its severity is no less in women, and 
some cases are outgrown, as in men. The conclusion would 
naturally be, then, that women would acquire stammering 
as much as men do. Then a further conclusion that they 
have nearly all been cured, would be necessary; because the 
men stammerers are to the women stammerers as 9 to 1, 
according to Colombat, Gutzmann, and Coen, as reported 
by David Greene. It has been customary to consider that 
women are nearly immune to stammering in order to account 
for the discrepancy in the numbers of stammerers in the two 
sexes. But such a position is illogical in view of the facts 
already cited — namely that every feature except disparity 
in numbers shows coincidence; therefore coincidence in num- 
bers should not be abandoned for a less likely explanation. 
The writers on the subject, with one accord, seem to have 
taken the illogical explanation, namely immunity from 
stammering instead of correction after it was contracted. 
Certainly some women have outgrown the disorder, so it 
would be necessary only for a large number to outgrow it 
in order to account for the disparity. The large number of 
cures in girls compared with boys is readily accounted for 
on the principle already explained of the prevalence of cor- 
rect speech over incorrect speech by the fact that the girl 
stays at home where she gets correction and ample oppor- 
tunity for free speech, but the boy roams? away from the 
house where he gets neither of these helping influences, but 
does get the ridicule that makes his stammering worse. 

But before we consider the explanations why women are 
supposed to be immune, let us consider the evidence on 
which immunity is assumed. Certainly there are compara- 
tively few women stammerers, both according to common 
observation and statistics. But both our observation and 
statistics are mostly from the beginning of the child's school- 
ing up to maturity. The period from the time of speech 
acquisition to the beginning of schooling is sufficient for the 
cure of many cases of stammering without observation; for 
parents understand stammering even less than the speech 



STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 167 

Specialists do, and even the specialists have overlooked much 
that is of value during that period. The failure to observe 
that stuttering is a cause of stammering, is an illustration of 
this oversight. Moreover, the principle by which nature 
cures stammerers has certainly not been common knowledge, 
so the possibility of any cures, and especially quick ones, 
would not occur to the observer. Needless to say it would 
not occur to those who deny such cures. 

Summing up this evidence we see that it is purely negative ; 
it does not show that women are more immune than men, 
and it does not show that the girls who might have stam- 
mered have not been cured. Of course one or the other 
alternative must be true, for no third explanation is possible. 
But those who select the immunity explanation take an 
untenable position because the fact that stammering is in 
every other particular alike in men and women is presump- 
tive evidence that it is alike in regard to the numbers which 
contract it. 

In support of the explanation by cures of most of the 
women stammerers we have the certainty of some cures 
by the process of outgrowing, and the logical explanation 
of the possibility of many cases outgrowing the disorder on 
account of the favorable environment of the girl. 

On the contrary the theory that women are immune has 
hardly a leg to stand on. It has no positive evidence that 
they have not contracted stammering as extensively as men 
do. The belief in immunity was adopted as apparently the 
only explanation of the absence of women stammerers of 
school age and older; but it has been shown that the more 
reasonable explanation of a large number of stammering 
cures in girls must be disproved before the immunity theory 
has a basis for existence. 

Suppose, however, we assume immunity in women and 
see where it leads us. Some women are certainly not im- 
mune, so the immunity must be a respecter of persons, 
unless we take the ground that the few women stammerers 
are those who were least immune. But in that case the 
disorder should show less virulence in women. On the con- 
trary women stammer just as severely as men do. Conse- 
quently the idea of general, although incomplete, immunity 
must be abandoned. The immunity must be absolute for 
some and nil for others. This requirement adds to the already 
serious difficulty in supporting this imaginary hypothesis. 

The explanations of the immunity idea have generally 
been arguments drawn from the fact to be proved ; the reason- 
ing has been, women stammer less than men, therefore they 
are more immune than men. Such arguments are not per- 



168 STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 

missible to show immunity, but it is permissible to show that 
women are more immune to other similar disorders, and to 
reason by analogy that they are immune to stammering for 
the same reasons. 

The fact that women are less subject to color blindness 
than men has been cited to account for immunity of women 
to stammering. But neither the causes nor the cure of 
color blindness are known, and the explanations of it are 
only hypothetical. On the contrary, we do know the causes 
of stammering, both the inducing causes and the continuing 
causes, and we know the cure; and we find that girls are as 
much exposed to the causes, that they have the requisite 
mentality to make them susceptible, — that is, to make an 
effort to talk when they find difficulty in talking — and that 
they are kept within range of the curative influences, namely 
correction and opportunity for free speech. We do not know 
that women are exposed to the causes of color blindness, 
for we do not know what those causes are. And in general, 
the two disorders are so dissimilar that analogies cannot be 
drawn safely. Stammering is known both to the victim 
and to the public; but color blindness is almost never known 
to either except as the result of a careful examination. 

The argument that man has greater variability than 
woman, specifically that the geniuses and the idiots are of 
the male sex, especially on the score of a 9 to 1 ratio of men 
to women, will certainly find opposition from the women, 
except, possibly, the idiot item. However, leaving such 
generalities, we can come to the specific characteristic in 
either man or woman which makes stammering not only 
possible but imperative, and that is to try to do what one 
wants to do. No one will say that this characteristic is less 
prominent in women than in men. All the talk about dif- 
ferent mentality, which was excusable when stammering was 
considered to be caused by a mental defect or by a char- 
acteristic lack of logic, must be abandoned ifi view of the 
fact that the stammerer has no mental defect, and that his 
logic is perfect. 

The Extirpation of Stammering. — Most books on stammer- 
ing are written with the view of curing the individual stam- 
merer or of promoting some particular method. The object 
of this book is the total abolition of stammering. This 
object can be accomplished by an educational campaign much 
less extensive tha^i many popular campaigns to eradicate 
human ills. Society should stop stammering both on its 
own account and on the stammerer's account. 

The way to stop stammering is to stop it. Some may 



STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 169 

think that such a procedure would make the poor stammerer 
diimb. To an extent they are right. For a time he would 
be partially dumb; but every stammerer does some correct 
talking, and that correct talking ultimately gives him the 
impression that he can talk. Then he is cured; for it is only 
the belief that he cannot talk which makes him stammer. 
But how about the stammerers who are in positions where 
they have to talk? Provision should be made for them to 
write, or they should be given other work. 

Although the principle of the cure has been described 
thoroughly, the proposal to abolish stammering without the 
consent of the stammerer sounds so revolutionary that more 
explanation may be needed. 

There is only one way by which stammering can be cured, 
namely, by the prevalence of correct speech over incorrect 
speech to the extent that the stammerer believes he can 
talk. This is nature's cure; but it is very slow, because 
nature cannot make the stammerer write when he fears to 
talk, neither can she make him seek opportunities in which 
he talks with the most freedom. Society can shorten nature's 
cures wonderfully by saying to the stammerer " We must 
decline to listen if you stammer; take the time to compose 
yourself, or write what you have to say." The chances are 
that he would compose himself and talk, or would start to 
write, become composed thereby, and say the rest without 
trouble. So a double gain would be made; not only would 
he retain the confidence which he would have lost by stam- 
mering, but he would add to his confidence by talking in- 
stead of writing. Some will say that the stammerer has a 
right to stammer, if he wants to. But that is not so. 
Society's duty is to protect itself from contagion and against 
incompetents, and the stammerer is certainly in that class. 
Also, society is culpable if it is accessory to the continuance 
of incompetency, and it is so when it allows stammering. 
The stammerer always has an accessory, for he does not 
stammer when he is alone. Society can and should decline 
to be a party to the encouragement of a disorder which is 
damaging to all concerned. Finally the stammerer does not 
really want to stammer. He may think that he wants to 
say the particular word which stops him for the time being, 
but he is merely suffering under the ludicrous delusion that 
it is more humiliating to write what he has to say than to 
stammer it, and he forgets that he is being cured when he 
stops stammering. Every time a stammerer, resists the im- 
pulse to stammer, whether he waits until he can speak freely 
or whether he writes, he is on the way to recovery. If he 
is so deluded that he cannot see his own best interest, that 



170 STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 

is all the more reason why society should take care of him; 
precedents are not lacking. 

The question will arise, " What is to become of the speech 
specialist?" He need not worry. Except that he will have 
to put his apparatus and his vocal charts up in the attic, he 
should do a rushing business for a time. But when the 
present confirmed stammerers have been cured, his occu- 
pation will certainly be gone if society does her simple and 
easy duty in regard to stammering. 

Let us try again to make the matter clear. Society is 
positively not to go into the business of curing stammering. 
That would require the giving of special instruction which 
it is unable to give. Society is merely to decline to listen 
to stammering. When the stammerer stops stammering, his 
normal speech will assert itself, he will forget to make the 
effort that causes stammering and in time he will be cured. 
Then no more stammering can occur, for the simple reason 
that no one will listen to it. To summarize, society is merely 
to assist the natural cures by declining to listen to stammer- 
ing; her attitude is to be merely negative; the positive in- 
struction for the correction of stammering is to be done by 
those who are trained in the work. Indeed, where society 
has entered the work by establishing instruction for the 
stammering school children, it has done more harm than 
good, because most modern methods make stammering worse. 

This disorder, which has baffled science until now, is 
probably the easiest to vanquish. The citadel which resisted 
every means of attack, now that its secret is known, is found 
to be vulnerable on all sides, and if it is not completely razed 
to the ground within a very few years society will be guilty 
of criminal carelessness. 

The declination to listen to stammering will completely 
abolish it within a few years; so it is probably unique for 
the ease of its eradication; no medicine, no surgery, no skill 
except for the chronic cases which will seek individual cures 
or cure themselves or die off. Its termination is as easy 
as its existence has been persistent. 

The proper public attitude in regard to stammering is the 
first requisite; and that is to treat the stammerer as the lame 
man is treated. The public foresees his needs and courteously 
steps in and supplies them. If he wants to make a difficult 
crossing they take his arm and help him along. If a mis- 
creant kicks his crutch out from under him they promptly 
pummel the miscreant. They should be as thoughtful to 
see the stammerer's needs, and should make it just as dan- 
gerous to exhibit impatience toward a stammerer as it is 
to kick the lame man's crutch out from under him, because 



STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 171 

the cases are identical; each is a helpless unfortunate, and 
the treatment confirms his difficulty. It will not be enough 
to stop open ridicule; the principal obstacle is supercilious 
impatience, so often exhibited by clerks and public officials. 
The public can safely say, " We can afford to devote a little 
time to stopping stammering in view of the big gain in time 
that will accrue from its abolition," One of the most exas- 
perating things about stammering is the extent to which 
mistaken feelings aggravate it; the stammerer feels that he 
will be ridiculed; he feels that he will not be allowed time 
enough; and the public feels that he is to blame. Stammer- 
ing would be reduced in intensity one-half if these largely 
mistaken feelings were removed; and they can be removed 
by making the stammerer "at home" in regard to his speech 
when he is abroad. All that is necessary is public knowledge 
that the stammerer always has the ability to, talk, and the 
disposition to gladly give him all the time he needs, or to 
wait until he writes. 

Little children will be largely instrumental in stopping 
stammering. One of the time worn nursery rhymes may be 
displaced by a little rhyme that relates our duty toward the 
stammerer. No foolish hesitancy will prevent the use of 
that information. The child that has it will promptly tell 
the stammering child that he should not stammer, but should 
wait until he can talk. If the numerous juvenile publica- 
tions would print a little sane advice about stammering 
instead of some of the fairy tales, stammering would be 
checked almost at its inception. 

Mothers occupy the best position for preventing stammer- 
ing. Only a little education about the disorder would enable 
them to stop it at the very start. The mothers who have 
never had a stammering child do not realize the importance 
of keeping on the lookout to guard against it. But that 
makes the opportunity for the mothers who have stammering 
children. They will quickly grasp the importance of steps 
which will eradicate the evil, and they should speak right 
up in the mothers' meetings, or at any other opportune 
time, and sound the notes both of warning and of rescue. 
Doctors and nurses should be required to know the cause 
and explanation of stammering, the principle of cure, and, 
at least, the negative means of suppressing it. All teachers, 
and especially juvenile teachers, should be required to pass 
an examination in regard to the management of stammering 
children. This information can be acquired within half an 
hour, and comprehensive knowledge of it can be shown in 
a two-hundred word essay; so no teacher fit to teach children 
would object to the extra labor of acquiring it. 



172 STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 

The school authorities should be shown how the oral work 
is promoting and continuing stammering, so that they will 
abolish the oral work for the stammerer, and will further see 
that the stammering child is treated with encouragement 
and assistance instead of ridicule and derision. 

Store keepers should see that their clerks are instructed 
how to act toward a stammerer. Pure business policy would 
dictate that. The portraits of the clerks who were hateful 
to me come to my mind vividly now, although many of them 
are in their graves. They never knew what humiliation and 
suffering their unkindness stirred up in a child's heart. The 
only detail of one place that I can remember is the lowering 
face of one clerk who used to snarl, " Why don't they send 
someone here who can talk? " His piercing black eyes, and 
his gaunt, unshaven muzzle come right up before me as 
though I had last seen him yesterday, instead of nearly 
forty years ago ; and I have not tried to remember him either. 
When my father would tell me to go to that place, I wished 
all the way there that the earth would open and swallow me. 

All who come in contact with the public, such as police- 
men, conductors, ticket agents, etc., should be instructed 
how to treat the stammerer. The stammerer walks needless 
miles during his life, just to avoid asking directions to his 
unfamiliar destinations. On a car the stammerer will risk 
a long walk rather than the humiliation of a curt remark 
from the conductor if he falters in saying his destination. 
Credit is due a large proportion of public service employees 
for the sincere " Take your time," with which they assist 
the stammerer; but generally that comes after the latter 
has failed to say what he wanted to say, and has been obliged 
to ask for time. The policeman and the ticket agent should 
learn to recognize stammering just as the bank teller learns 
to recognize faces. But that recognition should not be ac- 
companied with any sign of impatience, curiosity, or con- 
tempt. I have often approached a policeman in a strange 
city to ask directions, and although his general demeanor 
has been perfectly polite, his covert but intense glance at 
my lips to see what contortion I would make next, has been 
far more confusing than if he had told me to go to the devil. 

The telephone companies can do a considerable stroke of 
business by requiring their operators to treat stammerers 
intelligently. One day I went into a telephone booth in 
Amsterdam, N. Y., and took down the receiver. A voice 
said, " Number." I said nothing, but had nearly composed 
myself to say what I wanted to say when, " Number," in 
a sharper tone, upset me altogether. I said, "Central, I 
have difficulty in talking; won't you give me a little time? " 



STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 173 

A sweet voice came back, " I beg your pardon; I did not 
understand; take all the time you want; I'll wait." I gave 
the number, and delivered my message swimmingly. Then, 
with tears in my eyes, I thanked that girl from the bottom 
of my heart, and went away happy. I do not know any 
more about her than I have told here, but she will be an 
angel to me as long as I have recollection. Every telephone 
girl can be an angel to the stammerers; for if the torments 
of the damned come to earth they come to the poor stam- 
merer stewing in one of those sweat boxes, when his already 
confused speech is tied up as tight as a drum by an impatient 
interruption. A word of consolation then is like radiance 
from heaven. It will make him talk. 

Although the stammerer likes to talk, he shuns the tele- 
phone, because he generally has trouble with it. The thought 
that he cannot give the number — for he cannot substitute 
numbers as he can words — and the further thoughts that he 
is hurried, that central will be impatient, and that the person 
whom he is calling may be slow of comprehension, all these 
disturbing ideas contribute to defeat him from the start. 
The automatic telephone solves the difficulty of calling up; 
but the others remain. The operator who understands how 
to treat stammerers and has a heart can do much to solve 
the others. Then the telephone, instead of tending to in- 
crease stammering, will decrease it. 

Election officials should be instructed how to deal with 
the stammerer. Many stammerers never go near the polls 
for fear of speech trotible there, and those who do go, gen- 
erally hold election day in anxious anticipation for weeks 
ahead of its arrival. This is especially true when the stam- 
merer moves to a new locality where he is not well known 
and where his vote may be challenged. 

The courts should provide that the testimony of a stam- 
mering witness be taken in writing. The testimony will 
certainly be more reliable, for no severe stammerer can say 
exactly what he wants to say. In ordinary conversation he 
gets along by the use of synonyms, but that should not be 
permissible in a court of law, for the truth, the whole truth, 
and nothing but the truth cannot be obtained when it is 
related according to the words that are easiest to say. The 
prospect of undergoing a severe cross examination in court 
is a nightmare to the stammerer. There is not the least 
doubt that the fear which haunts his mind, even when the 
chances of realization are slight, makes such a deep im- 
pression of his trouble that his stammering is increased. 

Employers of stammerers can be highly beneficial in sup- 
pressing stammering. They should contrive to give the 



174 STAMMERING AND ITS EXTIRPATION 

stammering employe as much opportunity to overcome his 
trouble as business tempered with generosity will allow. One 
of those opportunities is the privilege of writing when stammer- 
ing is inevitable. If the employer will say, *' To please me, 
write instead of stammering," the writing would be done. 
But if the remark is, " You can write it if you want to," the 
stammerer is likely to think that he will lose favor if he admits 
defeat, so he will go down to certain defeat by trying to talk. 



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